Episode 1 of 2
Observation of Spark in Riess Spirals
- When
- 1886
- Where
- University of Karlsruhe
Hertz observed that discharging a Leyden jar into one Riess spiral produced a spark in another, providing a method to test Maxwell's theory.
In autumn 1886, after becoming a professor at Karlsruhe, Hertz experimented with Riess spirals. He noticed that discharging a Leyden jar into one coil produced a spark in the other. This observation gave him an idea on how to build an apparatus to proceed with the Berlin Prize problem.
Sources
- Heinrich Hertz Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-28
Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.